Obtaining Vital Status Information for SEER Program Registries Provide vital status information (i.e. date last known alive or date of death for cancer patients in their database) to each of the 15 registries. Each year each of the 15 SEER registries will submit a data file, including personal identifiers, for cancer patients in their database last known to be alive. These files will be linked to CMS files to provide vital status information on date last known alive or date of death. A file containing this information will be sent back to the registry to update the registry[unreadable]s database with this vital status information. The registry shall have a current Data Use Agreement (DUA) covering all data received from CMS. At or before the retention date shown on the DUA, NCI will either return the data to CMS, or destroy the data and notify CMS in writing of said destruction.